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The Exorcist III (1990)

The Scene: Nurses’ Station

Why We Love This Scene: I’ve written about The Exorcist 2: The Heretic before and I was a testicle hair short from reviewing both of the terrible dumpster fire attempts at a prequel for our 666 Schlocktoberfest (although I did rewatch them both and took notes—so it’s possible they will ooze on your newsfeed sometime in the future if I dare to waste my time writing about them) but we haven’t really touched much on the often-overlooked second sequel that turned out A-OK in our books.

The reason I’m bringing up The Exorcist 3 today is the original writer of The Exorcist, William Peter Blatty passed away last night. Not just a writer, he also directed some flicks. Case in point, he wrangled his creation back from the horrible depths after the abomination of The Heretic and made his own sequel from his novel: Legion and it turned out wonderfully. It’s well-acted, has great suspense and a very profound and thought-provoking story. I highly recommend it. Added bonus: You don’t really need to see any of the other Exorcists beforehand.

In fact, I believe I saw The Exorcist 3 before the original. Just a case of it was the early nineties when I was too young to work or drive a car, hence had many at-home Saturday nights and hey a new late-night horror movie is on cable kind of deal! I knew of the Exorcist but haven’t bothered to rent it yet at the time. Oh look, it stars the guy who voiced Chucky from Child’s Play. Cool!

It being Friday the 13th, it’s a double opportune time to show you one of the scariest scenes in modern motion picture history as well as give praise and memorium to the late Mr. Blatty. The scene, as most of my peers will agree, is a great jump scare. It’s actually one of the best and still gives me chills watching it. Now, it reminds me of those youtube pranks where you watch something innocuous but then something cuts in front of the screen and makes you elevate out of your seat for a moment. However, those are pranks made to fool the viewer, whereas, this scene is in the middle of a horror movie and still once it comes it still gets you. Excellent framing, camera-work and music all play a part in the scene’s effectiveness. It’s good to know that not only was Blatty able to make another Exorcist movie but that he accomplished in making a very excellent installment as well. Especially since the original is highly regarded as one of the best horror movies of all time.

The below clip is sadly, out of context but that doesn’t much matter as I bet it will still affect you—even if it makes you laugh because being effectively scared or seeing something frightening can still bring some sort of entertaining enjoyment from it. Good horror achieves that.